Saints do look like frauds to sinners like me whose heart is clearly not in the right place. That's precisely why they are saints and can work miracles and I am not and can't. Still, from a purely secular perspective, the aura of sainthood fascinates me. I imagine that Pio's canonization was advanc...

Big bucks are at stake here, along with much else of course. By firing Levine, and presumably taking away his pension and other benefits as well, Gelb has helped the Met's bottom line at a time when it badly needed some help. I'm not saying that's his reason, but facts are facts. I would not assume...

Padre Pio was clearly a fraud, but his heart was in the right place, as, to an extent was his brain. He used his reputation to get the poorest part of Italy a full-service hospital when the level of medicine there at the time was primitive. If only Mother Teresa had had so much sense in dealing with...

Protestants are 'heathens'? Does that include JS Bach? Its a joke. Oh, sorry; I wasn't sure because my husband said "that's what the Catholics used to say about the Protestants". (I don't ever remember doing that myself, BTW.) I was satirizing that view. I am an atheist now. I haven't been to any c...

I've heard plenty of criticism of Pius XII, particularly his role in looking away from the holocaust. This present Pope is unattractive with many of meddling pronouncements in politics, IMO. I preferred Ratzinger but since he abandoned the job this disqualifies him from any further engagement. I'm ...

Forget about the difference between Bergoglia and Ratzinger. There is a schismatic movement that calls itself Traditional Catholic. They are not sedevacantists; they think the last six popes are the real popes. However, they think the last one who was not false in his teaching if not downright heret...

Why on earth does anyone need three dozen versions of the Moonlight Sonata, unless they are part and parcel of some pianist's complete cycle? Every talented schoolchild can give a good performance, and that includes the not terribly difficult last movement.

Part of the problem is that John Paul II hated and feared the idea of women priests so much that he wrote an apostolic letter Ordinatio Sacerdotalis which affirmed the church's stand on ordaining women and did everything JP II could manage to elevate a matter of church discipline (which who can be o...

The latidudinarian Anglican church also considers Thomas Cranmer and Charles I Stuart to be martyrs. In the case of the former, that does rather contradict accepting Thomas More as such. I was aware of the phenomenon of acclamatio populorum producing saints that were let stand by the higher-ups. All...

"Jamais plus l'enfer!" Romero was clearly a martyr Traditionally, and I believe even according to church doctrine, martyrs automatically go to heaven. I do not know why they go through the process of forma canonization. St. Thomas More, a very great and important martyr, was not added to the canon u...

Their main collective restaurant "reviews" with their inevitable mention of someone saying "not cheap" every single time when it was not, remained intact. (They must have heard from a lot of country bumpkins who went to a starred restaurant in NYC and ended up with a bill over $200 for two and holle...

This takes place in Schroon Lake not far north of here. At least two items are of interest next summer. In particular, I thought Len and Sue might be interested if they happen to be making one of their North Country trips. I've never been there, but may take in Julius Caesar and The Great Gatsby . T...

Notice the first program on March 31, which I intend to attend. You might think that this is a provincial group, especially since it is rather pick-up, (The director is the concertmaster of the Albany Symphony, who happens to live in Stony Creek, population 750.) Around here even the relatively few ...

Yes, well, I should be able give them performances so " monochromatic and straitlaced." (With practice--a lot of it--Scarlatti is one of the few keyboard players I could play more or less to my own satisfaction. His work is often virtuoso, but it does not require a transcendental technique.) There a...

I never know what to say at times like this to comfort people. That's why I so often avoid the issue altogether. But I want you to know that my thoughts and sympathies are with you. I find the best way to get through it is to wallow in it. Don't try to escape it, just descend into a deep funk and l...

Long ago NPR had an excellent US version of Desert Island Disk. Hosts were alternately Martin Goldsmith and Robert Aubrey Davis early in their careers. It was first shortened and then alas canceled. There were many fascinating and/or famous guests, most of them not professional musicians. It is amaz...

Sincere sympathy for your loss, John. I'd say it was life well lived from what you've written about your father in the past. And it was a merciful escape from that dreadful cancer. I'm intrigued by your father's French name. For some strange reason, my eighth-grade-educated grandfather, who like my...

I don't often see messages related to personal bereavement here, but I wanted my CMG friends to know that my father, Jean-Baptiste Brosseau, universally known by his nickname Bucky, passed away this morning at a hospice near his home in Ruskin, Florida. He was 89. The cause was an inoperable maligna...

It is my understanding that archaea are not an original self-replicating life form but evolved like every living thing on Earth from primordial self-replicating molecules. The origin of life is the greatest mystery of science, unsolved by discovery or theory. We are closer to knowing (by theory that...

Wow, Len.!! Quite a photo, too long ago to remember when that was. :lol: How about these names from the past ? Lofstra.... I think you mean Slofstra, and Henry Slofstra is one of those who have gone over to the dark side (ha ha), meaning that he still posts a lot on Facebook, often about music. Sam...

His screen and real name was Chetinson, though I'm not sure about the spelling. We have lost a number of valued members, and not just to death. I still miss Nigel Wilkinson, who quit because he objected to Corlyss banning some people, even though every one of them at the time deserved to be banned. ...

I know nothing about this except that it showed up in an e-mail from Amazon. Unfortunately, it is not available free as part of prime, but can be rented cheaply. Might just be worth it for those who cotton to film music. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B073PVYLDS/ref=pe_2511310_273032790_em_1p_0_lm

I may have posted this before, but back when I was coaching my own Academic Team in Maryland, we were at a college-sponsored tournament. Some of these can be very rough. My own team always held its own and occasionally won, but almost any team around here would be creamed by the level of difficulty ...

Very nice, and I did not know these. I was all prepared to show off when I read the Wikipedia article, which reveals all. I knew that Rosenkranz means rosary, and Guildenstern is apparently a nickname for a baby boy. These commentaries on the characters in Hamlet are lost on modern audiences, as the...

Paul VI and John XXIII were also diplomats before being given the second and third most important sees in Italy. (Venice is much diminished now because of depopulation, but its historic importance is obvious and it is the only see in Italy other than Rome whose archbishop is designated a patriarch.)

Catholics were often considered aliens by nativist Know-Nothings In 1909 when the America magazine was founded, and of course even as late as 1960 when JFK ran. So maybe this name was the Jesuits' way of saying 'up yours' to the WASP birthers of that era. Likewise for the subsequent choice of Commo...

Pope Paul VI, notwithstanding his refusal to be crowned with a gilded, jewel-encrusted relic of the Middle Ages, is on the short list for canonization, possibly as early as this year. Francis's chances for sainthood are nonexistent—reactionaries brand him a heretic; worse still, he's on Motel 6's s...

I've always found it odd that one of the two major Catholic periodicals in the US, sponsored by the Jesuits, is called America. (The other is Commonweal, and I was friends through the chaplaincy with someone who became its editor-in-chief.) I guess this is good news. I can't think of anything cynica...

I'm all for reining in abuses (Cardinal Law is another case, but his sinecure was handed to him by a previous pope), but if I knew I was going to have to retire to the level of a mere curate after having literally owned every ecclesiastical property in a diocese (as American bishops do), I would ne...

I'm all for reining in abuses (Cardinal Law is another case, but his sinecure was handed to him by a previous pope), but if I knew I was going to have to retire to the level of a mere curate after having literally owned every ecclesiastical property in a diocese (as American bishops do), I would nev...

Well here's HOPEing she tells all and helps Mueller! What Trump has done with the Dem's memo is outrageous. Glad I can forget about alot of this while down here in the sun-only bad thing is at breakfast the TV is set on FOX News. Len :( I gave up my barber because she only ever had on Fox News I un...

Sometimes it could be a wealthy patron, today (not then) it could be crowdfunding, it could be a massive loan underwritten by someone. Do you know he has family money, or that simply a logical assumption? Elizabeth Pitcairn, whom I doubt you ever heard of, is the music director of the extremely loc...

Yes, now tell me that he was not an enthusiastic polemicist and lobbyist against abortion freedom to choose (in some cases violating separation of church and state), coverage of women's needs including contraception as a matter of routine in health insurance, and recognition of gay people other than...

. . . is not a saying of the late dubious Cardinal George, though he might have quoted it. I assure you, I have known my share of American Cardinals, and none of them was a man of sufficient stature to originate such a saying. Neither did the late cardinal originate this saying: "Speak no ill of th...

​ Not to put too fine a point on it, this is flat out Commie agitprop music. You can get a good idea of what its about @ http://americansymphony.org/deutsche-sinfonie-op-50-1936-58/ and this performance of the work is online @ YouTube. So why are you wasting our time, Rob? BTW, if I have not pointe...

Lance, as dear as you are to us as our irreplaceable moderator, will you please stop posting suggestions that involve only album covers when there is YouTube available? This is one of many possible selections.

Yes I saw some episodes, but speaking only for myself, but as an American, it is hard to get into that kind of humor (or humour), even though it is fairly well-represented on US TV. Did you ever see "A very British coup?" Now that one I enjoyed. I didn't see that series of which you speak. "Yes Min...

Yes I saw some episodes, but speaking only for myself, but as an American, it is hard to get into that kind of humor (or humour), even though it is fairly well-represented on US TV. Did you ever see "A very British coup?" Now that one I enjoyed.

Another perspective on the Met Parsifal : http://observer.com/2018/02/opera-review-met-opens-yannick-nezet-seguins-transcendent-parsifal/ Cheers. Thank you for your interesting contribution. I did have to turn off Ad Block to read that page, but it was worth it. Now why do we only have 20 posts fro...

The idea of "race" is really a sociopolitical construct with essentially no biological reality. When I was an instructor at Tulane University in 1977, Ernest Morial was running for the mayor of New Orleans, and the press was talking about the possibility of "New Orleans's first black mayor." When I...

We weren't promised a rose garden, j. Our time here is limited, and any one of a number of things could cause the entire species to go the way of all flesh at any moment. Expectations of species immortality based on political hope are as much the stuff of science fiction as thinking that our descen...

If they can discover a planetary system in another galaxy, as has recently been done, then they can figure this out too. That's the easy part; doing something to reverse any depletion given the current retrograde political climate will be far less of a sure bet. We weren't promised a rose garden, j...

Down here in st petersburg, Fl-nice and warm and sunny! I found this article and interview interesting-okay maybe alarming as well. Len :lol: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/05/arts/music/barrie-kosky-carmen-royal-opera-london.html Thank goodness for you that you and Sue are in St. Pete. It makes m...

Arrau is rather neglected these days, though it is not unusual for our stalwart Lance to uncover things like that. It is from Arrau (on a radio broadcast) that I first heard the simple but fantastically correct interlocution, "How do you know when to take a repeat in Beethoven?" "The rule is simple....